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I had been wanting to try exploring Jamaican cuisine for a while and a jerk spice was the first thing on my to try list. A jerk spice is spicy marinade for meats that primarily consists of allspice and scotch bonnet peppers. I had heard a lot of good things abut the scotch bonnet pepper, mainly being that it was nice and hot, and I had been wanting to try it. The remaining ingredients in the jerk mix can pretty varied. I found a bunch of recipes and picked and chose what I liked from them and I came up with this one. Because the scotch bonnet peppers were supposed to be really hot I started the marinade with just one and tasted it. It was pretty mild so in went a second followed by a third. I was thinking that the spice level would go up as the marinade sat and did its job so I stopped at three. Although the final result was nice and spicy I think I will go with five the next time that I make this.

For the first use of the jerk marinade I decided to do a jerk chicken dinner. I Marinated some chicken thighs in the jerk marinade overnight and roasted it in the oven. A nice and simple dish. The jerked chicken was nice and tasty. I really enjoyed the combination of flavours in the jerk spice mix. The jerk seasoning was spicy but not as hot as I would have liked. I served the jerked chicken with a simple mango and red pepper salsa to cool things down a bit and some Jamaican red beans and rice . Overall it was a really tasty meal!

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comments:

Looks great, Kevin! I love jerk, and you are my kind of cook with all those scotch bonnets. I think sometimes it's hard to get the full heat from a pepper in a marinade, but maybe you could boil the marinade you have leftover on the stovetop and then pour it over the cooked chicken for some extra flavor. The red beans and rice look so good, too!

Holy moly sir, that is a lot of ingredients for a marinade. It's sorta like the color white. I recommend you bottle it up and sell it for $10 a jar. Oh, but send me one first for quality assurance testing.

Oh yeah, jerk chicken! Wonderful stuff. I'm surprised your peppers weren't hotter - but I hear that a lot of peppers are being bred to be milder but still sold under the old names. I know jalapenos aren't what they used to be. Strange, that.

Sounds really tasty, Kevin! You did the same thing I always do...look at lots of recipes then pick and choose what sounds good to come up with your own! I haven't experimented with Jamaican style food yet but I can't wait to give it a try!

Mmmm... this looks delicious. One of my favorite Jerk dishes was served at a mountainside inn in North Carolina. The chef's specialty was Caribbean cuisine---I'll never forget that inn or its restaurant, as the food was terrific and the view was out of this world!

I've heard many good comments regarding jerk seasoning, but I've not had it myself. Your list of ingredients include some of my favorite flavors, so I'll have to take the plunge and try it. I do enjoy spicy, full flavored food; don't know if I'm brave enough for 5 scotch bonnets!

What wonderful flavors in jerk chicken. My friend owns this great little carribean restaurant in Ottawa, and man do they make some spicy jerk chicken and great rotis. Yours looks ready for the restaurant.

wait a second, kevin. i'm starting to think you did not buy a real scotch bonnet. did you take any pics of the ones you used? i've NEVER EVER heard of a mild scotch bonnet pepper. in our jerk recipe, we could barely use a full one b/c they are so intense in heat.

there are small peppers that look like scotch bonnet but they are not and have a VERY mild taste. i'm wondering if that's what was bought?

another thing i would recommend for anyone making a good jerk is 1) NEVER ever remove the skin from your chicken. 2) Rub some of your marinade UNDER the skin as well as all over the skin too - wear gloves b/c you do not want to get the scotch bonnet oils into your eyes later on.3) adding whole scallions to the marinade and pureeing the whole thing w/ more lime juice and a bit of olive oil gives it a mellow garlic/onion flavor too.

i'm still baffeled by this scotch bonnet thing! maybe i'm a weakling but they don't call the scotch bonnet the world's hottest pepper for nothing!

I've been to Jamaica many times, the first thing we always do is stop for jerk chicken. I've also made it at home many times but it's never as good as those smoky roadside stades. I agree there is something fishy about your scotch bonnets

I found this site called http://URAjerk.com maybe you can use it. It seems to help get me through the issues of dealing with some of the jerks I know. At least I can vent about these jerks, plus I get a kick out of sending them some cards.

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About Me

I came to realize that my meals were boring and that I had been eating the same few dishes over and over again for years. It was time for a change! I now spend my free time searching for, creating and trying tasty new recipes in my closet sized kitchen.